Some Thoughts On A Sunday. Definitely NOT A "Rant" or "Raging Fury"!

Yes, not a rant or rave or rage but just a bit of old comic chit-chat that I've had to clean up a bit in case kids are reading this.  Hey, we don't know half the swear words they use so let's not make ourselves look old farts, okay? 

 

When I posted that Di$ney were to publish yet another Marvel Secret Wars series there was this exchange between Subzero (Tales From The Kryptonian) and myself. The actual new item is here:

 http://hoopercomicart.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/get-ready-count-those-pennies new.html?showComment=1413108778167#c4278243660315497063

Subzero: Man, is it just me or was the first SECRET WARS just a cheap ploy to sell comics and every new incarnation has sucked on ice.

Don´t get me wrong, I LOVE the SECRET WARS II ( I´ll have to continue with that some day on the blog ) because that´s where I began to read American comics on a regular basis and there are just so many really wonderful tie in issues. But the main series was not that good.

And Bendis´ SECRET WAR mini ? Hated it. All the characters were acting strange, in fact it got so bad Bendis had to do SECRET INVASION to explain those were all skrulls.

In any case so far every " new " Secret War has been a disappointment and I don´t expect this one to be the exception to the rule. The original just came out in Germany as part of the Hachette Marvel library but it´s in two parts and if I EVER pay money for that again in hardcover the least they can do is put it in ONE book, okay ? I don´t need two SECRET WARS hardcovers. Really.

Now here is my much sanitised response.

Well, Secret Wars was meant to be a comic to promote toys but it created mystery and drama with the "White outs" and heroes/villains vanishing. Hey, it paved the way for Crisis On Infinite Earths...and we know how that turned out! 

Secret Wars II with the Beyonder was interesting and there were rumours that The New Universe which began with a "White Event" was the work of The Beyonder. No idea if they ever resolved that because selling Marvel to one new boss after another stemmed the flow of creativity that existed from 1964-1990. I did see two issues of Bendis' Secret Wars. That is ALL I am willing to write about "that". 

But this is Disney now and not Marvel of the 1980s. Disney executives get "aroused" looking at prospective sales figures (if kids read this I mean they "get very excited").  Imagine what happened when they saw the movie profits from Marvel characters? Comics -meh. Pitiful earnings BUT merchandise and toys...I wonder how much tranquiliser it took to calm them down.

Brevoort has said, in the extras on The Ultimate Avengers dvd, that basically "Stan and Jack and the others" were plodding around and not as sophisticated as writers and plotters are today. What those creators did made them THE top comic company and paved the way for the b****** to get his a** licking job. I have no respect for "It" as I like to call him. He is, quite literally, saying in the release "We are going to do a cross over series with lots and lots of money-making merchandise that YOU will want and you'll buy it cus yer dumb-a***s!" 

The movies make more than the comics and former X-Men joining an Avengers team means they CAN be used in any movie cus they aint X-Men...they are Avengers.

Can I see comics being cancelled or just used as promo material? Yes. This is Di$ney and the ONLY thing that counts is that $ sign.

I have both Secret Wars I and II in comic form. You can bet the price of a hardback or paperback is going to shoot up now. I have no problem with a company making money -that is business. But this has gotten worse it's greed, insulting fans and the fans saying "Okay. Gimme more" and when the comics vanish....well, the comic 'fans' have been the "enablers" here. All the loyal old time fans are vanishing and getting so fed up that most consider anything after 1990 to be dead weight.

Phew. THAT was cleaned up.

There have been a few X-Men versus Avengers stories over the years starting in the 1960s with X-Men #9 (1963) which all followed a, uh, "misunderstanding" between the two groups.  Fun, action and two of Marvels top teams duking it out -what more did a fan want?

Then, in 1968, the X-men tussled with the Avengers again thanks to plot twists begun in X-Men #45 (I think -hope it was #45!).  And the art...just look at this cover.  I can remember seeing it and just looking at it for a very long time.  I had found this on a news rack just after discovering Avengers #61 -"Some Say the World Will End in Fire... Some Say In Ice!" -which blew my mind because all the characters had changed!

It was a confusing time because UK comics republished  the various titles in parts every week and Alan Class would publish a full issue in one of his books and you might get lucky to find one of the US issues in the newsagents and there was no real continuity to follow.

But in 1968 the X-Men and Avengers fought but then linked up to combat the evil of Magneto who was/is a villain or may not be now but could be....I mean, come on, talk about re-booting a character so much that he's meaningless!

The X-Men #9 battle with the Avengers was later reprinted in King Size X-Men #1 and good luck in finding and buying that for under £50 (and on ebay someone was selling a copy for £200). 

But it never ended there.  It never does.  In the 1980s someone was wondering how they could get a few more readers to spend those dollars and we had X-Men v Alpha Flight and a few other minor mini series but then, in 1987, the inevitable happened.  Yes, believe it or not we had The X-Men Versus The Avengers which was, as the cover below shows, a four issue limited series.  Now I am positive that I have this series but can I find it? Noooooooo.

I've already written about the messy Avengers Versus X-Men series of recent times here: http://hoopercomicart.blogspot.co.uk/2014/09/heroes-on-run-as-super-heroes-become_18.html
so no point going over all that again.  I really do not want to!

 And my thoughts on Marvel now can be found here:http://hoopercomicart.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/the-good-old-marvel-days-are-gone-live.html

When asked what comic books I would recommend I came up with this, involving The Avengers: http://hoopercomicart.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/what-comic-book-would-i-recommend.html

And getting off of that subject let's go on to UK conventions.  There are a good few springing up and you do have to ask yourself how many the UK can support?  Will they all eventually just become regionalised rather than having a national appeal?  I think the answer ro that question is "Yes" -it is already happening and next year get's a new Birmingham convention.

So, okay, regional conventions with a few worth visiting as away weekends but here is a question: apart from the old Bristol Comic Expo a few years back which included UK and US comic characters in its publicity, why are all the events in the UK solely using US characters? Some not so well known as, say, Marvel or DC characters but American none-the-less.

We have a rich comic history in the UK older than that of the US and yet we ignore home grown characters because it is felt American ones are "more popularist"?  We need to really start using UK comic characters and -radical idea here- promoting British comics history.  I've tried this with one convention after another for a couple decades but none were interested.  Suck you.

Apart from all this we have the new publishing house Centrala.  Polish graphic novels translated into English.  Not the traditional US style graphic novel or trade that we have far too many of, but books with unique looks. I'm hoping that 2015 might see Centrala get to a few shows and if you are a show organiser -offer them a table!

There.  Did any of that hurt?

There are my meagre thoughts. And, incidentally, last night's Dr Who episode was probably the best I've seen in years.  Yes, I actually LIKED it.  I am getting old, you know!